Aro-naut

bibliotheca-babble-on:

bibliotheca-babble-on:

Dear non-aro people, especially non-aro people who don’t actually know aromanticism is a thing,

I know you don’t mean me any harm. I know you are not purposefully being arophobic.

But could you, maybe, stop making posts and writing stories and singing songs about romantic love as a universal constant, about monsters being humanized through their romantic love, about romantic love as the ideal relationship or life goal, about villains whose villainy is illustrated through their inability to feel romantic love?

I am aromantic. I don’t feel romantic attraction. Please stop leaving me and my community out. Please stop casting us as villains.Please stop making little aro kids think there’s something wrong with them because they look around and see romantic love as the norm and nothing that reflects them and their feelings.

Sincerely, Babs

(bolding and italicization mine to illustrate my point)

So this post is making the rounds again and I feel a desperate need to address something:

A fair few of the people reblogging this have interpreted as a blanket ban on romance in media, as “Babs wants us to stop creating all romance media ever!”

To be honest, I am not entirely sure where they’re getting that idea. Like. Go back and read those bolded/italicized statements again. Look at what I’m asking.

Hint: It’s not “stop writing romantic fiction,” it’s “stop writing amatonormative and arophobic fiction”

Some of these misinterpreters have told me my wording is confusing. But honestly, I don’t think it’s a wording issue.

What kind of issue is it? I don’t know. But there’s a problem when we aromantics ask for more aro-friendly media, and alloromantics respond with “you can’t just erase romance from media just because you don’t feel it!”

The fact so, so many people interpreted a post that very clearly states “stop using your media to harm us” as “you’re never allowed to write a love story again” just goes to show how vast this problem is.  

For one, I wouldn’t be surprised if many of them actually can’t think of a love story that avoids those harmful tropes.  The extent to which the worth of romantic love is hinged upon how much better it is, how little life is worth without it, how life never really began before meeting that romantic partner, etc. etc. is staggering—kind of like that absurd “platonic kisses shouldn’t be allowed because they make romantic kisses less special” post going around.  By asking them to remove those ranks of romantic love being superior, they act as if they’re being robbed.  By asking that people start respecting aromantic people, or even to simply stop actively harming them, they suddenly lose a significant amount of the language commonly used to celebrate romantic love.  Amatonormativity is really that embedded in the way people talk and think.

And along the same lines as this, this is just another textbook example of privileged groups acting victimized if you ask them to stop doing harmful things.  It all becomes about “oh noes you’re abolishing hte greatest stories in the world” without a thought spared for the children that grow up hating themselves and wanting to die (*raises hand*) because they’re told the only reason worth living is something they can’t have, or the people forcing themselves into relationships (*raises hand*) and trying to convince themsleves they want them because that’s what defines humanity and if they don’t ignore their own feelings and push past their own boundaries they’re disqualified.

But sure, let’s all fret about all the imaginary attacks on your precious [het] love stories instead.